Lingering Shots in an Age of Quick Cuts

By

Rachel Dodes

Feb. 21, 2013 6:54 p.m. ET

In the Oscar contender "Amour," an octogenarian man sits on his wife's bed and tells her a sad story about his childhood. The shot, which goes on for about six minutes, is followed by a 45-second scene depicting the man cutting flowers over the kitchen sink. In between the storytelling and the flower-cutting, something awful happens.

Today, the average shot in an American movie runs about two seconds—compared with 27.9 seconds in 1953, according to John Belton, a professor of English and film at Rutgers...